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Journalism of Courage
Do not be afraid to make a mistake,8221; was the sage advice proffered by Sonyco-founder Akio Morita, 8220;just make sure that you do not make the samemistake twice!8221; I cannot help wondering what it shall take for the SamataParty in fact, the National Democratic Alliance in general to take thatadmonition to heart. Over the past six months or so these worthies have donejust about everything they could to smooth Laloo Prasad Yadav8217;s path forhim.
Let me state for the record that I do not particularly care what happens inthe Bihar Vidhan Sabha in a couple of hours. The wretched state isguaranteed a bout of unstable, ineffective governance whe-ther or not RabriDevi wins the vote of confidence. That is the inevitable conclusion of aHouse where independents mu-st be wooed if a ministry must survive. Thatwould have been true of a Nitish Kumar administration, and it is still truetoday. That does not mean, however, that another Assembly election is on theca-rds: it suits the unattached MLAs to carry on getting concessions as longas they can.
The National Democratic Alliance made the cardinal error of ignoring theprinciple that a governor cannot make or break a chief minister, only theVidhan Sabha may do so. God knows the courts, up to and including thehighest tribunal in the land, have said so umpteen times! But no, theNational Democratic Alliance believed it knew better. It tried to bring downthe Rabri Devi ministry with Governor Bhandari8217;s aid several months ago, andended up with egg on its face. Having learned nothing from the experience,it tried again with Governor Pande with the same result.
I simply cannot understand the almighty hurry to make Nitish Kumar the chiefminister. Please understand that I am not criticising the choice even if theBharatiya Janata Party and the Janata Dal U acted very late in the day. Iam simply questioning whe-ther it was necessary to take the attention awayfrom Laloo Prasad Yadav just then.
Go back a little in time and see what the situation was like. The CPI andthe Congress had broken their alliance with the Rashtriya Janata Dal; bothparties had proclaimed that they were bent on ending the decade-long8220;jungle-raj8221;. There was a near revolt by the newly-elected Congresslegislators when Sonia Gandhi and her courtiers explored the possibility ofbacking Laloo Prasad Yadav. It was at this point that the NationalDemocratic Alliance rescued the Rashtriya Janata Dal chief.
It would have been very difficult for the Congress I or the CPI to offersupport to the Rashtriya Janata Dal. The le-aders of the National DemocraticAlliance could have sat back and watched the fun as Sonia Gandhi and LalooPr-asad Yadav tried to come to terms without losing face. It was theRashtriya Janata Dal boss after all who had sworn that Jharkhand would becarved out only over his dead body and then abruptly reversed himself whensummoned to Delhi by the Congress Working Committee.
It was Sonia Gandhi who had flayed the Rabri Devi ministry for its failureto curb the Naxalites and the Ranvir Sena. It was Ma-yawati and the BahujanSamaj Party that had accused the Rashtriya Janata Dal of ignoring theinterests of the Dalits.
All that the Samata Party, the Janata Dal U, and the Bharatiya JanataParty were required to do was to play a waiting ga-me. What was the worstthat could have happened? That Rabri Devi would be re-installed as chiefminister? But that is precisely what has happened anyway! No, the CongressI, the CPI, the Bahujan Samaj Party and other worthies should have beenforced to eat their words.
Laloo Prasad Yadav should have been forced to twist in the wind as he rushedfrom one party office to another in quest of support. The one thing that theNational Democratic Alliance should not have done was to provide a focus ofopposition.
It might be argued that the Bharatiya Janata Party, the Samata Party, andthe Janata Dal U lost little or nothing by making an effort anyway. I amnot sure that this is correct. First, the National Democratic Alliance hasbeen forced to publicly admit that the majority of the legislators in theBihar Vidhan Sabha do not support it. In the event of a crisis and one isalmost inevitable given the contours of this Assembly what locus standiwill Nitish Kumar and his allies have in bidding for a second time.
Secondly, the National Democratic Alliance was supposed to be different inkind from Laloo Prasad Yadav and his merry men. Trying to win support in RajBhawan rather than on the floor of the Assembly laid them open to the chargethat they were just as unprincipled as the Rashtriya Janata Dal.
The National Democratic Alliance had to beat a hasty retreat when GovernorBhandari dismissed the Rabri Devi ministry. I thought the leaders of thealliance had learned something from the experience; quite apparently I waswro-ng. The National Democratic Alliance once again found itself in thewrong when it accepted Governor Pande8217;s invitation to form a government. Onboth occasions the focus immediately shifted from Laloo Prasad Yadav8217;s sinsto the errors made by Raj Bhawan.
The Rabri Devi-Laloo Prasad Yadav regime has indeed been as corrupt andvenal as its opponents claimed during the election campaign. Inter-castehatred has risen to new heights. The state is bankrupt, and theconstitutional machinery has broken down altogether. It would be a blessingfor Bihar if the Rashtriya Janata Dal ministry is removed from the sceneonce and for all provided that it is defeated on the floor of the VidhanSabha, and not in Raj Bhawan.
